(Yesterday at 3:42 pm)Jal Wrote:

(Yesterday at 3:08 pm)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote: If your God can do all of that, why couldn’t It have set things up to work on their own without Its constant intervention? You’ve reduced your Imaginary Friend to the status of an incompetent engineer who can’t step away from the machine for even a second without it blowing itself all to flinders.

Boru

?
If He doesn't enforce gravity with His own hand, what will enforce it? 

Not getting you.  How about you tell me. Tell me how all these forces can exist without His hand constantly intervening (on my assumption that the intangible cannot impact the tangible).

The distortion of spacetime. And because they do.

Now you tell me: You repeatedly insist that God is material and tangible. What does It look  like? How tall is It? How much does It weigh? What is Its favourite colour? What does It like for brekkie? Does It have genitalia?

Remember - one of the qualities of tangibility is that it is mensurable.

Boru

(Yesterday at 3:40 pm)Jal Wrote:

(Yesterday at 2:56 pm)Angrboda Wrote: Consciousness at one end of the scale is complex, how simple can it be at the other end?  You've already admitted that a dead particle, a rock, possesses the attribute, so there really is no gap that is insurmountable in either case.  A dead particle, in your view, has the potential for the full complexity at the other end of the scale.  So where is your objection rooted?  You seem to have eliminated the obstacle.

Just as a side note.  Incredulity seems to do a lot of work for your worldview.  Is that wise?

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A rock isn't dead particles. I don't believe in dead particles.  All particles are conscious, most to a negligibly acute degree of self-awareness.

Then where does your information for what dead particles can do come from? According to you, there are none. So, this thing you've made up of whole cloth in a world that doesn't contain it has certain capabilities proscribed to it. Since we're squarely in the land of make-believe, what prevents me from imagining something called dead particles which doesn't possess the limits your made-up concoction has? Why should I prefer your made-up concoction to my own, as long as both are purely imaginary? It seems your only objection can be that you prefer yours for arbitrary reasons, or some justification involving the fallacy of the stolen concept. Why should I prefer your arbitrary declaration about what something imaginary can do to my own?

This is all pretty simple...if one can't understand or explain something the answer is "Goddidit".

The funny thing is, if I were to pull my daughter into the pool, that wouldn't be me doing it, because no part of myself ever makes actual contact with any part of anything else. It's all mediated by invisible forces. But if these invisible forces are actually God acting, then I can never be guilty of anything. I could stab my neighbor to death. But accordingly, that's not me stabbing my neighbor, that's God in his wisdom pushing the atoms of the knife around in tandem with the motion of my hand. So ultimately everything which occurs is an act of God in his world. Pull my daughter into the pool? God did it. Murder my neighbor? God did it. Cheat on my spouse? God did it. I'm basically sinless because I've never done anything wrong. God did!

(Yesterday at 3:58 pm)BrianSoddingBoru4 Wrote:

(Yesterday at 3:42 pm)Jal Wrote: ?
If He doesn't enforce gravity with His own hand, what will enforce it? 

Not getting you.  How about you tell me. Tell me how all these forces can exist without His hand constantly intervening (on my assumption that the intangible cannot impact the tangible).

The distortion of spacetime. And because they do.

Now you tell me: You repeatedly insist that God is material and tangible. What does It look  like? How tall is It? How much does It weigh? What is Its favourite colour? What does It like for brekkie? Does It have genitalia?

Remember - one of the qualities of tangibility is that it is mensurable.

Boru

"The Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to His friend."

He permeates the entirely universe, more or less sparsely, but densely enough to track every particle, while deliberately hiding Himself from our mechanistic detections/ instruments. This permeation causes Him to assume every possible shape imaginable. In addition to all this shapeshifting, however, He maintains at least three primary shapes consistently.

These three primary shapes/parts are the Trinity.
1. The Father is shaped like a man, and is seated on a throne.
2.  The Son is shaped in the Father image, shaped just like Him, and is seated at His right hand.
3. All radiance from Him toward the earth (and in general the remainder of His Presence) is the Third Person, traditionally misnomered Holy Spirit but properly the Holy Breath/Wind. This radiation includes the Light radiating from His face, the rivers of Fire flowing from His throne (see Dan 7), and the Wind/Breath emitted when He speaks and exhales.

I don't know why He chose to cultivate three primary subdivisions of His total substance. Perhaps He felt it was the best way to reveal Himself to His people? No idea.

Distortion of spaceTime? That's gibberish. It's wonderful that such doctrines facilitate applied science, but I don't have to take them as accurate literal descriptions of the universe. And I cannot accept gibberish as literal truth because I don't understand what I am being asked to accept.

If you really believe yourself to understand all these concepts, I can only say, "Enjoy your delusion."

(Yesterday at 4:17 pm)Angrboda Wrote: The funny thing is, if I were to pull my daughter into the pool, that wouldn't be me doing it, because no part of myself ever makes actual contact with any part of anything else.  It's all mediated by invisible forces.  But if these invisible forces are actually God acting, then I can never be guilty of anything.  I could stab my neighbor to death.  But accordingly, that's not me stabbing my neighbor, that's God in his wisdom pushing the atoms of the knife around in tandem with the motion of my hand.  So ultimately everything which occurs is an act of God in his world.  Pull my daughter into the pool?  God did it.  Murder my neighbor?  God did it.  Cheat on my spouse?  God did it.  I'm basically sinless because I've never done anything wrong.  God did!

I've heard that argument before, but it doesn't hold water (pun intended).  God isn't the only force acting in the world.

When you throw a punch:
-1.  free will moves your fist. That's the primary controlling impetus.
- 2. your muscles contribute some momentum as well.
- 3. If your punching upwards, God-as-gravity is actually SLOWING/ RESISTING your fist.
-4. If your punching downwards, God-as-gravity is accelerating it. 

He will either or punish or reward you based only on point 1, and your motives for the punch.

(Yesterday at 4:09 pm)Angrboda Wrote:

(Yesterday at 3:40 pm)Jal Wrote: ?
A rock isn't dead particles. I don't believe in dead particles.  All particles are conscious, most to a negligibly acute degree of self-awareness.

Then where does your information for what dead particles can do come from?  According to you, there are none.  So, this thing you've made up of whole cloth in a world that doesn't contain it has certain capabilities proscribed to it.  Since we're squarely in the land of make-believe, what prevents me from imagining something called dead particles which doesn't possess the limits your made-up concoction has?  Why should I prefer your made-up concoction to my own, as long as both are purely imaginary?  It seems your only objection can be that you prefer yours for arbitrary reasons, or some justification involving the fallacy of the stolen concept.  Why should I prefer your arbitrary declaration about what something imaginary can do to my own?

It's not an apodictic. Pansychism is a tentative assumption considered by some of us to be the most plausible axiom for building a world view.

Obviously many people, both theists and atheists, will reject that axiom. 

Not getting your point.

(Yesterday at 4:14 pm)awty Wrote: This is all pretty simple...if one can't understand or explain something the answer is "Goddidit".

While I get people being a bit fearful that religion will stifle science, I think the point is overstated.

It's not like all science will come to an end if people start believing that God enacts gravity. 

There are plenty of areas of science to research and explore. Every year the world faces new problems crying out for scientific solutions.